Funding directive row rocks FAAN,AIB

Should the Accident Investigation Bureau (AIB) get five per cent of the revenue from the Passengers’ Service Charge (PSC) of the Federal Airports Authority of Nigeria (FAAN)? A ministerial directive that FAAN should remit that revenue percentage to AIB has sparked a row. According to experts, the directive offends the autonomy clause in the Acts of both agencies. Unions and stakeholders are getting set for battle on the issue, writes KELVIN OSA OKUNBOR

A ministerial directive to the Federal Airports Authority of Nigeria (FAAN) to fund the Accident Investigation Bureau(AIB) is causing ripples in the industry.

Unless urgent steps are taken, some decisions of the Ministry of Aviation may throw a spanner in the works.

The controversy is on the remittance of five per cent of the Passengers’Service Charge FAAN collects to AIB.

Apart from the Nigerian Civil Aviation Authority (NCAA), mandated to collect five per cent Ticket Sales/Cargo Charge ( TSC/CSC) from airlines, and distribute among agencies, other parastatals fund themselves.

The Ministry of Aviation has given approval for five per cent of the PSC to be remitted to the Accident Investigation Bureau (AIB) to fund its operations, a development that is creating confusion in the sector.

Experts say such approval amounted to an aberration likely to rock the boat in the sector.

Consequently, aviation unions are mobilising to stall the implementation of the directive should FAAN go ahead with the directive.

Such approval, the experts say, is unhealthy for the sector because the transfer of funds from one agency to another contradicts the establishing Acts of the agencies and amounts to robbing one agency to pay another.

Officials of FAAN and the Ministry of Aviation have declined to comment on the directive. No reason was given. But it would apear their refusal is predicated on the controversy the development is generating in the sector.

According to investigations, with an estimated 15 million passengers travelling through airports yearly the AIB may earn about N4.2 billion from five per cent of PSC okayed for it by the Minister of State for Aviation, Hadi Sirika.

This is besides the N2 billion yearly subvention of the agency and the three per cent monthly Ticket Sales Charge (TSC) collected by the NCAA.

Investigation revealed that FAAN collects N1,000 each from domestic travellers while it charges $50 (N18,250 at the exchange rate of N365 to a dollar) each from international passengers as PSC.

Last year, 15,233,597 passengers passed through the airports; 11 million of the travellers moved within the domestic scene and 4.2 million were international travellers.

However, opposition is increasing over the development as the National Union of Air Transport Employees (NUATE) has kicked against the directive.

Unions kick

NUATE General Secretary Comrade Olayinka Abioye insisted it is not in the purview of the minister to unilaterally grant the request of AIB, which sought 10 per cent of the PSC, without passing through the National Assembly.

He challenged AIB to justify the three per cent of Ticket Sales Charge the Nigerian Civil Aviation Authority (NCAA) remits to it since its establishment in 2006.

Abioye vowed that the unions would kick against the approval at the right time.

He said: “As unions we do not think that it is the right thing to have been done by the minister because allocations to parastatals are not within the purview of the minister. It should be part of the responsibilities of the National Assembly.

“Also, has AIB justified the three per cent it has been collecting? We have to know what they have been doing with the money. Again, why 10 per cent or they just flew a kite at the minister and he grabbed it? That is not fair. Why should FAAN be allowed to suffer the failure of AIB in devising positive non-aeronautical means of generating internal revenue?

“What happened to the budget approved by the Federal Government and National Assembly for the training of personnel in AIB? There are lots of questions and I want to say here that we are going to kick against this position.”

Also, members of the Nigerian Union of Pensioners (NUP), Federal Airports Authority of Nigeria (FAAN) branch, and the Association of Nigerian Aviation Professionals (ANAP), have condemned Sirika’s directive.

Investigations revealed that FAAN has been grappling with the payment of gratuities of some workers who left service since May 2016. With such financial responsibility, the unions said directing FAAN to remit five per cent of the PSC would deplete its purse.

The unions said AIB was not doing much and, therefore, did not need five per cent of the PSC.

Their position is that if AIB was in need of money, the Ministry of Aviation should provide such funds in line with laws that established it.

Speaking on behalf of ANAP, its Secretary-General,Comrade Abdulrazaq Saidu, said such move by the ministry would not be accepted.

He said what was expected from the ministry was for it to first address the debts owed service providers by airlines.

He said: “If they don’t have money, let the government pay them. FAAN is taking care of many things – equipment, control tower. Most of the equipment are being taken care of by FAAN. AIB is not doing anything for anybody. It is not ideal and we, the unions, are ready to challenge the ministry on this issue.”

AIB’s request for 10% PSC

AIB on June 6, 2017 received Sirika’s consent to its request for five per cent of the PSC collected by FAAN.

A document made available to our correspondent by a source in the Ministry of Transport, addressed to the Minister of State for Aviation, and dated June 5, indicated that the Commissioner of AIB, Akin Olateru, requested for approval for FAAN to allocate 10 per cent of the PSC to it.

Olateru explained that with the Federal Government’s commitment to make aviation work for all stakeholders, especially for the public, it was necessary for the ministry in tandem with the National Assembly to make additional funds available to AIB for it to be adequately funded to deliver on its primary duties.

“Pending recruitment to beef up acute personnel gaps in the bureau and the non-utilisation of a duly commissioned AIB’s Safety Laboratory, which costs over N1 billion to set up, because of paucity of funds required to upgrade the soft and hardware store components.”

However, Sirika on June 6, approved the request, saying: “We discussed. Approval is hereby given. Convey five per cent approval.”

AIB replies critics

Olateru in an interview, said those kicking against the approval were mischievous.

In justifying the request and subsequent approval, Olateru decried that apart from NCAA, it was only AIB that was not profit-oriented.

He lamented that only three per cent was allocated to AIB from the five per cent TSC collected by NCAA. NCAA gets 58 per cent, the Nigerian Airspace Management Agency (NAMA), 23 per cent, the Nigerian College of Aviation Technology (NCAT) gets seven per cent and the Nigerian Meteorological Agency (NIMET), nine per cent.

He said FAAN and AIB were government’s agencies, wondering why any association would kick against it.

He added: “Of the PSC, it is only FAAN that spends the money 100 per cent, yet the same FAAN charges include advert, parking and landing of aircraft, and land, and cars coming to the airports.

“Anybody that says it is not fair for us to get a part of the PSC is wicked because who owns the two agencies? It’s the Federal Government. We all share the TSC and FAAN doesn’t share its PSC with anybody and the government in its wisdom says ‘FAAN please give AIB five per cent.’ I don’t think that is too much. It is within the power of the minister to do that.”

He decried that paucity of money was stalling the release of over 35 accident investigations, and the training of accident investigators since 2013.

He stressed that the agency needed to develop its human resources to compete with others.

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